Today I had a strange dream. I dream that I was drowning, it was an horrible sensation. I was actually screaming for help in the dream. I woke up from the dream in the early moning. I was in a middle of a sleep paralysis (I didn't know it was sleep paralysis at first). It was horrible too, I felt...terror. I was looking at the ceiling, and I think I was hallucinating, am not even sure if it was the sleep paralysis or if I was dreaming. Something red with tenctacles was floating and emerging from the ceiling. Everytime I blink it started to become bigger and bigger. The center of the red thing also change, it change from different colors to eyes. Then out of knowhere, I was looking at a square infront of my eyes. It had caramel and white colors. After a few seconds...I started moving. I got so scare I hide in my blankets for a few minutes. Then I woke up and proceed to write in my dream journal, and that is when I realise it was sleep paralysis.

Basicly...I think I read somewhere that you can go into lucidity while having sleep paraylsis. Is this true? So what do I do when it happens again? I was very scare at the moment, but not anymore. Now that I know it was simply sleep paralysis...

Irishhen wrote:Is sleep paralysis one of the first step for lucid dreaming?

No, in fact most of the time you never experience SP while awake. Most of the reports of sleep paralysis on this forum are from people who have little or no experience so sorry but I have to discount them.

IMHO, think there's a bit of imagination with some of the claims of SP and some people do seem to like talking about sleep paralysis on this forum, maybe because it sounds cool or something.

I lucid dream quite a bit and almost never have experienced it while awake, even when using WILD. It's not that common to experience SP, most of the time you are sleeping when it occurs. It's certainly not something you have to experience in order to LD.

Have you ever had a dream, Neo, that you were so sure was real? What if you were unable to wake from that dream? How would you know the difference between the dream world and the real world? Morpheus

Irishhen wrote:Is sleep paralysis one of the first step for lucid dreaming?

No, in fact most of the time you never experience SP while awake. Most of the reports of sleep paralysis on this forum are from people who have little or no experience so sorry but I have to discount them.

IMHO, think there's a bit of imagination with some of the claims of SP and some people do seem to like talking about sleep paralysis on this forum, maybe because it sounds cool or something.

I lucid dream quite a bit and almost never have experienced it while awake, even when using WILD. It's not that common to experience SP, most of the time you are sleeping when it occurs. It's certainly not something you have to experience in order to LD.

Of course it is in my imagination. This is not the first time I experience sleep paralysis. Maybe it has to be the fact that I sleep really late, and some days I only sleep 4 to 3 hours. I believe that is your own experience and opinion. I actually do SP often. Sometimes its scary, and sometimes it is just buzzing in my ear and vibrations. I only have encounter two scary SP, this one and one that I saw a like a man infront of me during my sleep. Well I will see what to do.

You didn't mention that you only sleep 3-4 hours a night in your first post. That's probably the reason why you are experiencing SP more than normal. The conventional wisdom is that you need to get at least 5 hours of sleep before trying to LD. It's almost impossible to WILD on that little sleep. If you still end up in SP, just relax and keep going, you should go through it as it is just a stage along with the vibrations, etc. I've done WILD quite a few times and only experienced either of these one time. The main thing is to get past any fear you have during the process. Good luck and let us know when you succeed.

Have you ever had a dream, Neo, that you were so sure was real? What if you were unable to wake from that dream? How would you know the difference between the dream world and the real world? Morpheus

I've got some experience with sleep paralysis. I've also noticed a lot of talk about it lately, and some feel it's an important part of the lucid dream journey. It's not. But it can happen to some incidentally.

I saw tentacles too, but they were black and came from under my bed and grabbed me. One thing I noticed in my experience and correct me if I'm wrong, but the fear came first, before you saw it didn't it? The fear comes before the form. It's a dream that occurs in bed, just like a false awakening, and like you, they occurred after I would wake up from a dream. (And I awoke in a nightmare!)

I tried fighting it. I tried befriending it. But in the end, I just ignored it. I would keep my eyes closed, ignore it, and not let it's touching of me scare me. It would press on my legs, tap me on the shoulder, make the bed sheets 'shrink wrap' around me or constrict me. JUST IGNORE IT! And don't let fear fuel it. Fear is what gave it life to begin with.

After 30 seconds of torment, which feels like 2 minutes at the time, it use to just vanish in an instant. (I realize now that was my body slipping into muscle atonia and nothing more). As soon as that happens, simply get up and look around. You're already asleep and in your own bed dreaming your own bed room! You feel out of body!

Now with more exposure and experience, I don't get it at all much.... knock on wood because it would probably happen again sometime I'm sure. I have many more dreams to go. But it's very rare now, and some never get it in the first place.

But that's how I dealt with it. I tried fighting. I tried loving. Then I gave up and just ignored that pointless phenomenon. The 'monster' is just a dream character that you, yourself give life to.